AUTHOR SKETCHES BIOGRAPHY OF THE CREATOR OF DRACULA.(LIFE & LEISURE)

Byline: MALCOLM L. JOHNSON

Barbara Belford's ``Bram Stoker,'' subtitled ``A Biography of the Author of Dracula,'' tells a sketchy story of a most mysterious life.

Only true devotees of ``Dracula'' know much about the man who created him nearly 100 years ago, thereby spawning a movie subgenre that produces at least one child of darkness every single year.

That Bram Stoker (born Abraham in Dublin, of Dutch stock) was not a bizarre recluse like H.P. Lovecraft, nor a tragic poet like Edgar Allan Poe, may come as something of a revelation. Instead, he was a clubby, proper Irishman, tall and red-bearded, athletic and even heroic at one point of his life. …